ady to
receive and to give all that is best in youth, not to be unworthy of the
confidence which a young mind is willing to place in its guidance.

For although so much stress is laid upon the impressionability of first
childhood and the ineffaceable marks that are engraven on it, yet as to
all that belongs to the mind and judgment this third period, in the
early years of adolescence, is more sensitive still, because real
criticism is just beginning to be possible and appreciation is in its
spring-tide, now for the first time fully alive and awake. A transition
line has been passed, and the study of history, like everything else,
enters upon a new phase. The elementary teaching which has been
sufficient up to this, which has in fact been the only possible
teaching, must widen out in the third period, and the relative
importance of aims is the line on which the change to more advanced
teaching is felt.

The exercise of judgment becomes the chief object, and to direct this
aright is the principal duty of those who teach at this age. It is not
easy to give a right discernment and true views. To begin with one must
have them oneself, and be able to support them with facts and arguments,
they must have the weight of patient work behind them, and have settled
themselves deeply in the mind; opinions freshly gathered that very day
from an article or an essay are attractive and interesting and they
appeal very strongly to young minds looking out for theories and clues,
but they only give superficial help; in general, essay-writers and
journalists do not expect to be taken too seriously, they intend to be
suggestive rather than convincing, and it is a great matter to have the
principle understood by girls, that it is not to the journalists that
they must look for the last word in a controversy, nor for a permanent
presentment of contemporary history. Again, it is necessary to remember
the waywardness of girls' minds, and that it is conviction, not
submission of views that we must aim at. A show of authority is out of
place, the tone that "you must think as I do," tends without any bad
will on the part of children to exasperate them and rouse the spirit of
opposition, whereas a patient and even deferential hearing of their
views and admission of their difficulties ensures at least a mind free
from irritation and impatience, to listen and to take into account what
we have to say. They are not to be blamed for having difficulties i